Sticks and stones... and sheet metal

That's what our house is made of!


Yes it is sort of funny how we spent so much money to dig out and haul off the huge pile of rock that was in and on our lot originally, and now we're paying money to have new rock delivered and attached to the house as decoration. Some parts of building just don't make sense...but I won't get started on all of them. The huge pile of 14 tons of malapai rock is slowly going onto the house front.

The rock and mortar look great. These guys do a great job figuring out how to fit the stones together and vary the shape and color of the rock pattern to make it all look right. Sounds like a tough job to me! The goal is to get all of the rock work done before it gets too cold. It's better to let the mortar dry in warmer conditions, so they cover it at night.

Winter is here!

Sleet and snow last night brought a very white mountain today! It's very cold, we even turned on the heat in our rental house today. We are so glad that the house is dried in and we don't have to worry about the interior getting wet any more. Insulation is nearly done and they brought all of the drywall in today.

Attic access above the jack and jill bath sink room.

The monster fireplace is moved into it's home with the metal flashing nailed down to the subfloor.

The first round of aspens look pretty bad (black leaves!) So I planted a second batch last weekend on the other side of the house...hopefully they fare better. They've had plenty of rain this week!

The drywall is all upstairs now.

Marvin made the second collar tie so we can have both trimmed out with doug fir before the dry wall goes in. The ceiling fan will hang between the two.

The winter view!

Although they weren't supposed to start dry walling until Monday they apparently did the garage today. Looks a lot different without the block wall and framing showing!

Fall is here!

An afternoon storm on Friday brought our first snowfall on the mountain. It was all melted by Saturday morning, but that's the sign that summer is officially over. I had some fun playing with the camera this afternoon, so I included some of my artsy shots for something different!

Plenty of wood cut and split for our first fire in the new fireplace. Andy and Joe cut this aspen the other week.

Some of the dead wood that we saved for backyard landscaping.

The windows have a pretty cool reflection!

The big pile of malapai rock that will be used for the rock veneer on the front of the house and the chimney.

There is green stuff growing in the backyard!

So we aren't the only ones in Flagstaff to use metal siding and malapai rock. Kip told us to go check out this engineering firm because the stone was done by the same guys that will do ours. The metal doesn't look too bad with the malapai...although our house should look less industrial with all of the windows and the hardi siding.


Okay now onto the house update...

Plumbing and electrical were finished last week, so they started insulating mid-week. Drywall will arrive this coming Wednesday and the insulation will be inspected. Marvin built the front stairs and we've been discussing the driveway.

The stairs have a large landing about 2/3 of the way down and then turn 180° to go back toward the house which should allow for a gentle transition from the driveway to the concrete pad below the stairs.

The excavator came back and dug out the dirt and cinders near the curb so that the curb can be cut for our driveway.

The excavator also worked on back filling the south side of the house. He made it look much easier than when we were moving dirt with shovels and the wheel barrow.

The start of the malapai rock pile for the stone veneer on the house. Much more to come...


A quick look at all of the insulation. The different colors are for different insulation R values.

The Great Wall

We accomplished our weekend project! We built a retaining wall around the area that was excavated to the left of the driveway. They will pour a concrete pad in this area when they pour the driveway so that we have a nice level area to store our trash and recycle cans. The electrical and cable boxes are over on this side of the house as well. The big cement box in the ground is for the controls for the driveway heating system (for when we're old and can't shovel the driveway anymore!).

First step was to finish the excavation. This involved lots of shoveling and the electric jackhammer that Steve loaned us.

Once the hole was large enough, we could work on filling in the trench with crushed rock (out of spec ABC was the fill material of choice). Steve loaned us his large truck with a load of ABC. Many more hours with the shovel and wheelbarrow. Getting a level base was quite tedious, but Andy did a great job leveling and compacting.

Saturday morning we took Steve's truck to the local block place and picked up 64 landscape blocks and 30 caps. This was over 6000 lbs...Steve's truck handled it much better than the Toyota would have! It was easy loading with the fork lift, but unloading was another story... The driveway is too steep (and full of gravel) to be able to pull up so that meant walking each block up from the road.

A few more rounds of leveling the base and measuring with the transit and we were ready to start building with the block! Of course we had to pick a complicated shaped wall with a corner and an inside curve. We agreed on the placement of the first level and then it was supposed to be cake just stacking the blocks up from there. But of course the blocks didn't fit perfectly with the funny curve and corner. Luckily Steve loaned us his masonry saw so Andy had the tools to cut the blocks easily and make them all fit.



Joe stopped by and helped carry some blocks up the hill. He enjoyed seeing the progress and lending a hand...especially since it wasn't his project to worry about!

Deciding on the stair step pattern down with the top caps and the amount of back fill required was complicated, but I think we did a pretty good job guessing and planning. We finished up Sunday afternoon and had some daylight to spare for once! Now the excavator can finish back filling behind the wall and all along the south side of the house to get our positive drainage away from the house.